Traverse City's Newest Restaurants Are Moving In With Roommates

Four Traverse City spots made Northern Express's Fall 2026 NoMi Restaurant Guide, and none of them has a building to itself. One sushi bar works inside a winery's tasting room. Another sushi kitchen is a vintage trailer in a barbecue restaurant's parking lot. A French brunch café took over an empty restaurant space in a multi-tenant warehouse, and a shawarma kitchen moved into a marketplace it shares with a coffee bar and a brewery.

The arrangement is why these places could open at all. It also means each one depends on the host's lease, the host's parking lot or the host's calendar, and right now several of those are changing at once.

A Sushi Bar Inside a Winery's House

The clearest example sits at 115 Franklin St. It's a two-story Victorian that used to house a music school, and it overlooks Grand Traverse Bay. The Ticker reported in June that Dojo Sushi had closed its North Long Lake Road location and that owner Brent Shafer would run a sushi bar inside Bonobo Winery's new downtown spot. Dojo first opened at the Long Lake Culinary Campus in December 2020 and moved in with Bonobo in August.

On paper this is one business inside another. Bonobo CEO Todd Oosterhouse and his family own the house. In Northern Express's September profile, he said Bonobo runs the place and handles the alcohol, while Dojo operates within the building.

"It's just an off-site tasting room, if you want to use the legal term." Todd Oosterhouse, to Northern Express

That setup shapes the whole visit. You order wine at one bar and sushi at the other, take a number, and sit in any of three rooms, because there's no table service. The house seats about 27, including eight seats at the sushi bar. Bonobo pours eight wines here, a smaller list than at its Old Mission Peninsula flagship. Glasses run $9 to $13 and bottles $24 to $28, and you can take bottles to go. Rolls start at $12 for a California and top out at $22 for the Seven Spice Tuna. Shafer told Northern Express that being downtown "was always the end goal." Sharing the house got Dojo there.

Who Hosts Whom

The same pattern shows up across town in different forms. Here are the pairings as last reported:

Each host gives the tenant something different, whether that's a liquor license, a parking lot, a finished kitchen or foot traffic. The terms differ too, and on Eighth Street they run out with the summer.

On Eighth Street, the Deal Was for Summer

Eric Kolden has made sushi in Traverse City for years. He started the sushi program at Red Ginger and ran White On Rice for almost a decade. Northern Express reported in September that he bought an old Streamline trailer and "struck a deal with Cordwood to park in their lot for the summer." He told the paper it took about five weeks to go from buying the trailer to serving his first roll. The Ticker described it as a retrofitted 1966 Streamline. At the June launch, hours were Wednesday through Sunday, with dinner service until 10 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays.

Kolden's favorites are the shrimp tempura roll and the katsu curry. He has also said he'd like to add ramen, bao buns and pot stickers eventually, though he's in no rush. The October restaurant guide still lists the trailer at 1125 E. Eighth St. No published report has said whether it stays parked there through the winter, moves, or closes for the season.

The trailer sits in the East Side Social District, and that district has a fixed season. The City of Traverse City created it in 2024 in the slip lanes along East Eighth Street near Garfield Avenue. Closing those lanes to traffic turns them into a shared outdoor commons. Under the City's rules:

• The district is open 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. from May 1 through Oct. 31.
• Adults 21 and older may drink there, but only alcohol bought from a qualified business, served in a labeled cup of 16 ounces or less.
• You can't bring your own drinks, and drinks can't leave the district.
• The City currently lists Oakwood Proper Burgers, Tank Space and Common Good Bakery as the qualified businesses.

The City's management plan says the lanes reopen to cars after Oct. 31. That gives the outdoor commons less than three weeks from today. The City is also planning past this season. In early 2026 it won a $100,000 Community Placemaking Grant from Project for Public Spaces, supported by General Motors, to address accessibility, pedestrian safety and connections across the corridor, which the City says the district's temporary layout makes harder.

A little farther down Eighth Street, Colibri Wine Bar runs indoors, so the Oct. 31 date doesn't affect it. La Bécasse owner Guillaume Hazaël-Massieux and partner Bastien Le Guen opened it in June inside the Commongrounds Cooperative building, with a full bar, a long wine list and small plates. Colibri's website lists hours of Monday through Saturday, 4 to 10 p.m., plus a winery event on Oct. 15 and a Champagne dinner on Dec. 17.

On Hall Street, the Building Just Sold

Eric and Amy Fritch opened the first Patisserie Amie on East Front Street in 2005. Since then they've run a larger space on Lake Avenue, Brasserie Amie, and then Le Metropolitan, a food truck stationed at Traverse City Whiskey Co. The Record-Eagle reported that after a fire damaged the truck in November, the couple found the former Hexenbelle restaurant space at Warehouse MRKT, and Chez Amie opened there in April. The paper described brunch service every day except Tuesday and Wednesday. The menu includes the croque monsieur, small breakfast pizzas on fromage blanc, a full "Les Oeufs" section and beignets. The October guide says Fritch plans to bring back weekend "bistro nights," likely Fridays and Saturdays from 5 to 8 p.m. That was still described as a plan, with no start date.

Meanwhile, the building around the café changed hands. The Ticker reported on Sept. 22 that Warehouse MRKT, an 18,454-square-foot building with nine tenants, sold to Aevitas Medical Consultants, which is moving from Front Street into the spaces Waara Technologies and Darling Botanical Co. are leaving. Several tenants told the paper they had recently been offered leases of two years at most. Artemis Books & Goods says its lease runs through February 2028. Water Bearer Coffee and Handz on Art, which has been in its spot for nearly 30 years, both said they hope to stay. Co-owner Dr. Jeff Valice told The Ticker that Aevitas would reach out to each tenant directly.

Darling Botanical owner Megan Kellogg, who is moving to the Tru Fit Trouser complex on Woodmere Avenue, described the broader pressure to The Ticker:

"It's a seasonal community, and it's hard to afford being a small business on Front Street. We have to push out to the fringes to find that potential and exist."

Shared buildings like Warehouse MRKT are part of how the city's independent businesses find room. Coverage of the sale did not mention Chez Amie's lease specifically.

On Cass Road, the Kitchen Was Waiting

Atomic Marketplace shows the model working from the other direction. In July 2025, The Ticker described it as a new multi-tenant project that already housed Seismoto Coffee Bar, with Nocturnal Bloom Brewing planning a grand opening. The building had a fully equipped kitchen that had never been used. Chef Zachary Anderson had been considering options that included a food truck, and he told Northern Express the space immediately felt like home. Acorn Kitchen was open by December 2025.

Anderson builds his menu around "what no one else is doing." For him that meant shawarma he had trouble finding after moving north, plus weekly chalkboard specials. Acorn's online ordering page lists hours of noon to 7:30 p.m. Monday and Wednesday through Saturday, 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Sunday, and closed Tuesday. Seismoto's site lists 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily. Between the two, you could get coffee in the morning and shawarma in the evening without leaving the building.

A Week of Shared Tables, Before the Calendar Turns

Some of these arrangements depend on dates, so timing matters:

1. Before Oct. 31: Go to Eighth Street while the slip lanes are still closed to cars. Order burgers from Oakwood or drinks from Tank Space and sit in the commons. While the trailer is still parked there, Streamline's shrimp tempura roll is a few steps away.
2. Oct. 15: Colibri's winery event inside Commongrounds.
3. A weekend morning: Brunch at Chez Amie on Hall Street. Check before you go, since Tuesday and Wednesday have been closed days and bistro nights haven't been confirmed.
4. A clear evening: Take a number at both bars at 115 Franklin St. and get a seat with a bay view. The house only seats about 27, so it can fill up.
5. A gray Sunday: Coffee at Seismoto and brunch at Acorn Kitchen, both under one roof on Cass Road.

Hours at shared spaces change with the host's schedule, so check each business's own channels before you head out.

Hillary at Found Realty Co keeps track of these openings and shared spaces because they're part of what makes a Traverse City neighborhood feel like home. If you'd like a guide who knows which trailer is parked where and which porch has the bay view, Find Happiness at Home and schedule a personalized consultation.

This article is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Consult a qualified professional about your situation.